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Trying to understand the twists and turns in the Oklahoma shooting case

Michael VincentUpdated
Sun 9 Feb 2014, 7:30 AM AEDT

This week a preliminary hearing began involving the three teenagers charged with the murder of Australian baseballer Chris Lane in Duncan Oklahoma. One of them has become a witness for the prosecution against his co-accused, North America correspondent Michael Vincent has been at the trial.

Transcript

ELIZABETH JACKSON: This week a preliminary hearing began involving the three teenagers charged with the murder of Australian baseballer Chris Lane in Duncan, in Oklahoma.

One of them has become a witness for the prosecution against his co-accused.

Our North America Correspondent Michael Vincent reports from the courthouse.

MICHAEL VINCENT: James Edwards Jr was 15 when he was arrested and charged with Chris Lane's murder. That was on August 16th last year.

The youngest of the three accused teens, Bug, as he is nicknamed, is a hulk of a child. A wrestler, he stands tall and composed in his prison orange jump suit.

"Yes sir, no ma'am." He's polite and his voice rarely falters as he answers questions. When he entered the court as state's witness, he said he had "tension". But then he calmly stood and pointed at his friends, not missing a beat. If this was a shocking betrayal of many years friendship, the other two didn't react at all.

Edwards is now the key witness in this preliminary hearing and potentially any trials to follow, and more significantly he may have helped himself and his co-accused escape the first degree murder charge against them.

And that is critical, as I'll explain later, but just remember: motive, swerving and blanks.

If James Edwards Jr provides testimony against his friends he may only face the charge of accessory to murder after the fact and he might not serve any time at all.

And that's a far cry from the initial reaction of authorities in Duncan in the days after Chris Lane died. They were predicting that these three teenagers would all go to jail for a very long time - a life sentence in Oklahoma is 45 years.

There's a long way to go in this judicial process; not all the evidence has been presented, and in the US a preliminary hearing just has to reveal enough evidence to prove probable cause, and with Edwards' evidence that may get them over the line.

And so what did this now 16-year-old reveal in court? Well it was, to say the least, surprising: that when he got into Michael Jones' car that Friday afternoon, it was because he'd offered them marijuana for a lift to the court house.

And then what followed was one of the most bizarre and unexplored statements of the day. He was asked to tell the court about any conversation he had with Luna and Jones on entering the car.

He said he'd asked Jones and Luna 'did they shoot a donkey the night before?' And they said 'yes they did.' That was it - no talk about it - simply they'd killed an animal by shooting it. This the night before Chris Lane was shot.

To this statement about indiscriminate violence targeting a defenceless creature, there was no follow up question from the assistant district attorney.

It was as if both of them had already talked about this other incident and it just had to be confirmed and not be discussed at this time. Edwards simply continued saying that they drove on in silence. And silence is the key to much of what went on that day: "we didn't talk", "they were quiet" was Edwards' testimony on many occasions.

They first saw Chris Lane jogging in the distance while they were waiting at a set of traffic lights. Edwards says the next he knew, the car was swerving and there was a gun shot.

He didn't see anything because he had his head down rolling a joint on the top of his laptop in the front seat, that he looked into the rear view mirror and saw Chris Lane grab his stomach.

The other two: Jones, who was driving, and Luna, who was in the back seat, were "shocked and cold", but as the car sped off no-one said anything, no audible reactions at all.

When they stopped at a nearby restaurant car park Luna handed the gun to Jones. Edwards says that that was the first time he saw the murder weapon.

The 16-year-old said it was a black and brown .22 revolver. Then another critical piece of evidence, that Luna said "I thought there were supposed to be blanks in the gun."

And Jones had replied "Me too, I'm sorry".

Jones hid the gun under the bonnet of his car and they drove Edwards to the court house for a meeting with his juvenile probation officer.

And so to motive, swerving, and blanks.

Chancey Luna's lawyer Jim Berry is comfortable that the murder was not pre-meditated.

JIM BERRY: These young fellas thought there were blanks in this .22 gun. There was a swerving, it could've gone off accidentally. There are a whole lot of things that need to be dealt with as far as anybody makes a pre-determined judgement as to what happened, that pre-meditation is not the case here.

MICHAEL VINCENT: So no pre-meditation means potentially a lesser charge and sentence for all three. But what about that statement by Michael Jones to police in August that made headlines around the world.

Remember? That they said they decided to kill someone because "they were bored".

Jim Berry:

JIM BERRY: We don't know, and it's very - first of all, he was charged as a youthful offender. They elevated it to murder in the first degree, so we don't know, that's all I'm saying.

MICHAEL VINCENT: So you think there's a strong case there so far, from what you've heard?

MICHAEL VINCENT: Jim Berry says he doesn't think Mr Jones' statement about "boredom" can be used against his client, the accused shooter Chancey Luna.

And speaking of shooters, if James Edwards Jr says he had nothing to do with the killing, why was he so desperate to find out the whereabouts of the murder weapon?

Ray Allen Controller: that's the code he used in a phone conversation with a friend outside the prison to check if the weapon had been disposed of.

Ray Allen Controller - it was a term he used in two conversations. Mr Allen is a sharp shooter for the Miami Heat basketball team and the NBA's leading scorer.

James Edwards confirmed the conversations to the court and the significance of the code. He did not explain his motivation, nor was he pressed on his motivation, for wanting to ensure that the murder weapon was safely out of the reach of police.

The murder weapon has never been recovered and no-one has explained why three teenagers even had a gun in the first place.

All three accused are back in court in March to find out if they'll go to trial.

This is Michael Vincent in Duncan, Oklahoma, for Correspondent's Report.